


you've almost convinced me i'm real

by wajjs



Series: [ t o u c h ] [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU, Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bittersweet, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Cyborgs, Dehumanization, Jason Todd didn't die, M/M, Not Beta Read
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-14 14:07:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,638
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28796625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wajjs/pseuds/wajjs
Summary: It's not my death, he thinks then and every cog in every joint whines when he stands up again. It's not my death, there'll be no funeral.
Relationships: Jason Todd/Bruce Wayne
Series: [ t o u c h ] [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2111268
Comments: 2
Kudos: 26





	you've almost convinced me i'm real

**Author's Note:**

> mourning the loss of all the cool formatting this has in google docs.................

**you've almost convinced me i'm real**

The display is cracked and crucial systems aren't rebooting. He stays where he is, all but embedded into cracked and splintered crates, wood not cutting him because what little skin he has left is always perfectly covered. It's the torn wires that are the problem, it's the crushed hand that his systems no longer recognize.

It's not my death, he thinks then and every cog in every joint whines when he stands up again. It's not my death, there'll be no funeral.

Peripheral systems will do in a pinch and he guides his steps back into the fight. He tears into something, feels his weapon piercing skin, flesh and bone. Another one goes through him at the same time, though, slices him in half. It's okay, he says.

"That won't do it," he says, again, "I'm not human."

Silence follows for an instant. It feels fitting, in a way.

"Then tell me, kid," the other's voice is a rumble, steady though strained around the gap under his ribs, "why do you bleed?"

  
  


S Y S T E M S ••• L O A D I N G •••

> C R I T I C A L • S T A T E

> 9 7 % D A M A G E

> F O R C E D S H U T D O W N • 1 0 … 9 … 

A dripping sound that he can barely register, coming from a source he cannot see. He's still pretty sure it's his own body, it's coming from the clean cut the sword made through his middle, slicing him in two parts—quite literally. His legs are completely disconnected from the rest of his still running programs. Moving the one hand he has left, he lets out a crackling sound, distorted around the hole in his smashed display, as he feels the exact point his torso is no longer attached to the rest of his body.

He feels frayed wires, broken alloy panels, what's left of his spine. And he laughs. He has to, since he’s in no mood for screaming.

The other, still in the room, scoffs. "Christ, kid," he spits out, sole of his boots scuffling against the concrete ground as he moves around, "you are almost worthy of pity."

> 4 … 3 … 

" _ **H** ~~o~~_ p **e** ," his voice cracks and malfunctions, the sound coming out like an uneven, cursed thing no one should hear, "h0 _p_ e I d **i** e **_t_** hi **s** _ti_ **m** e. D **e** _ath_ str0 **k** e."

Under the mask, Slade allows himself a moment of raw feeling. This could be his kid, he tells himself while going through the obvious parallels and the many what ifs that haunt him. And maybe that's why he picks his sword again, why this time he aims for the head. It’s mercy. Something he’s not known for, but— 

An explosion goes off that fills the room with smoke. Then, it’s no one else but  _ the _ Batman himself tackling him to the ground with extreme fury, snarl on his lips and hands closed into fists. As they skid through the dirty floor of the warehouse, whatever remains of the body of the one and only Jason Todd finally shuts down. And Slade might understand why the kid doesn't think of himself as human. Even from this point of view, the poor bastard looks like anything but that.

Torn up and shattered, he shares a closer resemblance to a broken and thrown away doll than to other humans. Where’s the face, the recognizable features, the everything on the outside that the whole of humanity clings to when it comes to classification, to determining whether you are part of an ‘us’ or an ‘other’.

With all honesty, Slade thinks: that's really no way of living.

When Jason comes to, for one second he thinks he's gone back in time—he's back in that room with the bright white lights, the surgery table, the machines connected to him and the thick cables that go for part his guts being rearranged into their respective cavity. The differences don't take too long to settle in: the stalactites, the dripping of natural humidity, the cowl pushed back and the hands of Bruce, not Shiva, putting everything back where it should go.

Jason would smile if he could. There are things he'll never not mourn.

" **B.** "

"I'm almost done," oh, Jason knows. These are the systems that power him and the cables that go inside him. He can tell.

The frown on Bruce's face, the downwards tug of his lips, they say more than the man's words could ever hope to achieve. He's angry, for starters. But also, he's—

"I' ** ~~m~~** ," one of the thinner cables lets out a spark and they both wince when Jason's display goes haywire for one hot second. " **I** ' _m_ s ~~0~~ r _r_ **y**."

"Don't talk," is the expected order. After a minute, for both of their sakes, he decides to turn off his systems again.

In the gardens, gardens so big it's quite possible to get lost in them, Jason stops next to an old mark in one of the many old trees. He knows this one: it's from that time he tried to sneak out and attempted to guide himself this way, the thought not fully realized in his head yet to let him come to the natural conclusion that he was leaving an easy trail to follow. 

Just like back then, Bruce finds him with no effort. Like they are bound to always run into each other even when going in opposite directions.

"I've talked to Cyborg," Bruce's words compact so many meanings into each syllable, there should be a dictionary for the Robins to come. Here what goes unsaid is what is truly important.

"Have you, now."

An offering and a denial.

They both speak the same language that, more often than not, they choose to ignore.

Jason follows the width of the mark with his fingers—pushes away the few display windows analysing texture, give and resistance. They come back with a vengeance when, surprising everyone, even themselves, Bruce places his hand atop his, closes his fingers around the crevices between Jason's. Holding hands. They are holding hands.

If he had an actual heartbeat, it'd be drumming away so fast.

"Don't do that again, Jay," perhaps it's the tenderness with which Bruce says his words that disarms Jason so easily. Perhaps it's how close they are, how Bruce is looking at him like he's the moon, the stars, the sun. Like he's actually worth—worth loving. Like there's anything left worthy of care. "Don't try to leave me again."

Jason's outer display is carefully kept blank. It won't do anything good to let the other see the many error messages popping up as he's trying to control the way some of his systems are reacting in mock replacement of what the real deal is like. Above all, he wants to… he wants to cry, wants to curse his existence, wants to curse everything and everyone because he  _ can't feel this, can't feel Bruce's touch, can't feel the callouses he knows are there, the texture of his skin, the very real warmth under it. _

There’s no memory to fall back on. There are many things that had no saving by the time Shiva got to him, by the time he was laid out in a cold flat table and was promptly turned into a faux cyberpunk version of a cursed modern Prometheus. So there are things—memories that perhaps  _ should _ be there but aren’t, of moments spent in happiness that are now long gone.  


But also, he wants to curse because _what of me deserves this._ _I've strayed too much. We both know._

It's Jason's own hand holding the proverbial knife, then. It's by his own design and doing that he makes this crash, that he turns his once perfect dream into a complete nightmare. Something inside shifts as he puts under lock anything that might give him away. Almost like he’s signing away more of what little is left of his humanity, like he’s willingly becoming more machine, because the human in him yearns and begs for this. Let me have this, it says. But Jason knows that nice things never stay, and bad ones might as well never leave.

< _ You know it was me who did it. _ >

Everything in Bruce's expression is screaming at him to stop. He can’t, though. Their hands fall apart from the tree and from each other. At least he had this one thing before everything came to its natural end.

< _ You know I killed him. _ >

There's no enjoyment when he shatters this to smithereens. No, there's none of that when the one he's always needed  and wanted lets go of his hand, when those eyes finally look at him like he's an other.

Jason really misses being able to smile.

His steps take him with no change in rhythm of difficulty back to the mansion, back to its many halls and rooms and hidden passageways. He walks uninterrupted till he reaches the main door. There it is, the new little thing, the new kid with the bright eyes and the extreme need to please and be accepted. This one’s fall will be a thing of beauty.

< _ Take care of the old man, _ > his voice has yet to go back to normal. The kid’s eyes are as big as they can be, staring with a mix of fear and wonder.

His fall will also be a pity.

“Where—where are you,” Jason walks past the threshold, doesn’t stop for more than two seconds, “where are you going?” The kid finally asks. His laugh is fake. Mechanical.

< _ Good luck, kid. _ >

Jason’s not going to return. 


End file.
